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With revisions to the engine and specification, the 2015 Aston Martin Rapide S should impress kids of all ages

'It sounds like a tractor,” screeched the four-year-old, most impressed. If this were a cartoon, the Aston Martin’s enormous grille would have drooped at the edges to make a sad face.

Embarrassed, the boy’s father, who had taken on the enthusiasm of a small child himself when I first brought the car over, started to explain that the 6.0-litre V12 didn’t sound like a tractor at all, before conceding that his son was most likely just thinking of the loudest and coolest thing he could. And loud and cool the four-seater Rapide S most certainly is.

Occupying the other rear seat was my 20-month-old son, thus allowing me to answer that question on all potential Rapide owners’ lips, “Can you fit a child seat in?” Not only that, but we also squeezed his buggy in the boot, which might just make this the world’s best family car, with the caveat that you bring a few bibs to shield the supple leather upholstery from sticky fingers.

It occurs to me at this point that there are things I should mention about this four-door flagship aside from its FordFocus-rivalling practicality. Such as the fact this is the 2015 model year Rapide S, and so features a series of small upgrades in a (clearly 100 per cent successful) bid to generate some extra column inches at an otherwise quiet time for the brand.

The behemoth of an engine, already the subject over the years of more enhancements than Renée Zellweger’s face, has been carefully fettled once again. The result is an extra, ahem, 2bhp to take the total to 552bhp, while torque swells by a similarly modest 7lb ft to 465lb ft.

More significant is the replacement of the old six-speed automatic gearbox with an eight-speed unit, and those two extra ratios do make a difference; shorter in the lower gears, they cut the 0-62mph time from 4.7sec to just 4.2sec, while a revised final drive takes the top speed over 200mph for the first time (don’t worry, the car also gets bigger brakes to slow you down again). Fuel economy and CO2 emissions have also improved, which will no doubt be a relief to those with the £147,950 required to buy this car, before options are added.

What’s it like? Well, if the grin on the four-year-old’s face was anything to go by, stupendous, both for how from 5,000rpm onwards all that torque squeezes you into the perfectly formed bucket seats, and because it has television screens in the backs of the headrests.

The dad seemed quite taken too, although he later complained that my pointing out how bad the satnav is, not to mention all of the stalks and switches from a Nineties Ford, had taken the sheen off the experience. Oops.

And me? Mostly I loved it, not because it’s perfect, but rather because it feels like a car built by people who care about what they are doing. And for all of its flaws, there is nothing else that will waft you and your family around with quite the same sense of occasion. Plus, of course, the knowledge that while the ride is supple enough to soothe, you are never more than an ankle-flex away from the raw thrill of that V12 at full chat.